Vocal Voices

Arrivederci, au revoir, adios, vaarwell.

No MPs now that Carswell has quit to become an independent, no policies of any note now Bexit is achieved, no reason to exist any more, and no great loss.

Turn out the lights and close the door quietly behind you if you would. Thank you and goodbye.

I never liked Carswell anyway. He might have been the only UKIP MP but I think he brought about the downfall of UKIP. Was he a plant? I don't know, but I would be surprised if the Conservatives took him back. Still you never, know, you can't trust politicians. Maybe Nigel will re-emerge. It was a pity he resigned when he did. It might have been a different story

It will re-emerge in some form or other. If only to out the truth when the other parties try to get back into bed with the EU.

Once Farage left, UKIP was pretty much doomed to oblivion. No proper leadership, too much infighting, and a principal fund donor only too ready to pull the plug.

But nevertheless it has served a purpose - it has shown that basic, independent-thinking, right-wing politics is alive and well in England, despite all the efforts of the multy-culty liberal-leftie-luvvies. Alive to the tune of 4m votes, and it will be interesting to see where they go in the next general election.

UKIP was a single issue and opportunistic party.

Its sole aim was to get the UK out of the EU, but it was making little headway until Blair opened the immigration floodgates. Once that happened UKIP had a peg to hang its hat on and it played to the masses of all parties who were concerned.

It never had a strong core following, but it was very good at borrowing the votes of a wide spectrum of the electorate. Its main achievement(?) was in panicking the weak kneed and spineless Cameron into giving us a totally unnecessary referendum on the EU, but he helped them in that respect. Had Cameron reduced immigration, as he was perfectly entitled to do under EU rules and international law, UKIP would have been way behind the Greens and slightly above the Monster Raving Lunatic party.

Some of us will not miss its demise. There will be no Phoenix.

They were always a "One trick pony" set up, and I'm glad to (hopefully) see the back of them!

Frank, you never said a truer word!

I always felt UKIP were a more acceptable face for the BNP to hide behind. If they had ever had the power I think that would have become very apparent

UKIP had three things in their manifesto which I could relate to - leaving the EU was the main one, but also they supported 50/50 shared care following divorce, and a tax level starting at £15.000. They are a right wing party but there is also a right wing in the Conservative Party. I dont see Nigel Farage as someone who would hide behind the BNP and I never saw UKIP as a racist party. Nigel Farage has done this country a great service by persisting in his determination to give the people of the UK a referendum. I was around when Ted Heath conned the electorate into believing we were voting for a trade agreement within Europe. Without the efforts of Nigel Farage people with similar views to me would not have had the oportunity to put right that deception.

This is all from an English point of view. If you look at it from a Scottish point of view, the UKIP are no different from the SNP. Who have been called everything you are now calling the UKIP. However the SNP is there to stay, forever, now.

What I see is a matter of timing. Had the UKIP had to keep building it's MP base and growing into a greater and greater threat, until they eventually wrested government from the incumbents, as the SNP did, they would be so entrenched into Politics that the old 3 party system would have finally collapsed.

All I see is a timing thing where UKIP didn't have enough time to become solidly entrenched into politics before their Raison d'etre was taken away.

However, don't count UKIP out. They will have a case to make for many years to come that the incumbents really didn't want to split from the EU and so they need to be watched and kept in line until the UK is firmly set on it's path.

Calling the UKIP dead is premature. It may come to pass after the exit from the EU, but I don't see it in the very near future.

Maybe I phrased that wrong. I didnt necessarily see UKIP as a racist party as such, but I think for people with racist leanings, e.g. BNP supporters, they were the party of choice and I think had they had more power, more people would have joined and tried to force more BNP type issues

Hope that makes sense?